Gate of Hell - Part IV

Image by kalhh from Pixabay

“Tom! Tom, wake up, already! Come on, dude! You gotta wake up before they come!”

Edmund stooped over him when he warily opened his eyes.

“What’s… what’s going on?”

“You passed out,” said Edmund before letting his eyes shift to the shadows all around them. “Can you walk? Tom! Can you walk or not?”

“Yeah, I- I think so.”

When Tom stumbled up on his feet and looked around, the last thing he expected to see was the suffocating darkness. Where in the whole world were they?

Then he recalled the mysterious shipwreck and the ablaze portal.

His eyes grew wide with terror and he was about to say something aloud when Edmund placed a finger on his lips and hushed him.

“Scchh! Be quiet!”

Tom followed the boy’s darting eyes that settled on the surrounding shadows. That was when he noticed them, too – those faceless people watching their every step.

Gulping hard, Tom whispered, “W- what are those things?”

“Don’t look at them! You never should!”

“W- why?”

Edmund took his sweet time replying, visibly pondering something before speaking his mind.

“You said you believed in that nonsense, right?”

“The Gospels?”

“Hmm! The Gospels…”

“Yeah, I do… somewhat.”

“Then, you must believe in the hereafter I suppose?”

Tom knitted his brows. “The hereafter?” He briefly looked away. “Like… Hell?”

Edmund nodded. “Yes, Hell.”

Tom cast another look around upon realising what the other meant. But how could this be? How could two humans still alive and kicking be in Hell? It made no sense!

“Listen, you asked me about my mum, remember?”

“I- I did…”

Edmund drew a deep breath before he continued. “The truth is, my mum’s been dead for the last ten years. She caught a wicked disease and passed away shortly after giving birth to me.”

“What are you trying to say? What’s that got to do with—”

“My dad said she’s in Hell because she abandoned us! He said all womenfolk who die at childbirth are bound to rot in the bottomless pit and pay for their sins.”

“I… I don’t understand.”

“You said you believed in the Gospels!”

“I- I do, I just don’t—”

“It’s written in the Gospels, Tom! My dad said so!”

“What’s written… exactly? I’m- I’m sorry, I’m having trouble following.”

“That with the mist, opens the Gate of Hell!”

“Gate… of Hell?”

“And we’ve found it! We really—”

“You lied to me!” Tom backed away as Edmund tried to reach out to him. “Why would you do such a thing!”

“I… I thought you wouldn’t come here if I told you the truth.”

“Yeah, you bet I wouldn’t! Are you out of your mind! Gate of Hell!?”

Edmund dropped his head. “I’m- I’m sorry. I just… I just didn’t want to come here all alone.” He looked up. “Honestly, I didn’t even think the Gospels were telling the truth. I thought it was all some made-up story…”

“What now! What were you thinking coming here? Do you even know what your mum looks like? And even if you do…”

Tom couldn’t continue upon seeing the dejected look on Edmund’s flushed face.

“You’re right,” Edmund muttered. “I don’t know what I was thinking. We… we gotta find a way out of this place.”

“Well, the portal’s gone.”

“There’s gotta be another way out.”

“And if there isn’t?”

Edmund took his time replying. “There has to be! Tom, I promise you. I’ll get us back home no matter what, okay? I promise!”

Gate of Hell – Part III

Image by Rick Khan from Pixabay

The rusty shipwreck looked like a relic forever lost in time. Algae and other kinds of microorganisms had eaten through its metallic surface and turned it soft and rotten. It was a miracle it washed ashore in this poor condition.

“W- we should return now,” stuttered Tom, visibly fraught with horror at the sight of the massive ghost ship that washed ashore after the storm. “It’s too dark out here and so bitterly cold!”

“What are droning on about? Let’s go inside and take a look!”

“Wait, what?”

Before Tom could get another word in, Edmund rushed forwards and climbed the tilted shipwreck.

“Hold on! What are you doing! Edmund! Get down! Get down before something bad happens!”

But Edmund didn’t listen to a single word he said, and before Tom could make his trembling legs listen to him and advance, the boy disappeared into the shipwreck.

Reluctantly, Tom clenched his jaw and went after Edmund. Why was he so stubborn, he thought, before climbing up to the barely stable deck.

“Edmund! Edmund, where are you! Edmund!”

When no reply returned, panic set in.

What if something bad happened to him? Thinking of the worst possible scenarios, Tom picked up the pace and searched every nook and cranny while calling out to his new friend.

Seconds morphed into minutes, and before he realised it, several hours flew by.

Left with no option but to seek help from the grown-ups back in the market square, he made up his mind to return to the woods, when a sudden clamour arrested him.

It came from the captain’s cabin, which was blocked off by the mizzen and main mast, which collided and now looked like a cross. It was impossible to reach the captain’s cabin.

There was, however, a small gap where those two wooden poles crossed. Without a second thought, he squeezed in through the gap and entered the cramped chamber.

It wasn’t that he did not expect to see anything but the spectacle before him was anything but ordinary, or something a kid like himself could conjure up in his wildest dream.

A mighty portal ablaze with what seemed and felt like a miniature storm within stood before him. Taking a careful step forwards, he stretched out his hand only to retreat in the same second.

Like a black hole, the stormy portal sucked him in.

“E- Edmund? Edmund, are you here? Ed—”

Through the raging storm inside the portal, a hand reached out to him and a shrill scream drowned out as soon as it reached his ears. Before he realised it, his feet moved and the portal took him with it to the abode of the damned.

Gate of Hell - Part II

Photo by he zhu on Unsplash 

“Hey! Yes, you! Hurry!”

Edmund waved the blond boy over from where he hid behind the blueberry bushes across the churchyard. He had seen the kid working the field across Nanny Ruth’s farmhouse down the single-lane road before, but other than that, he hardly knew the boy.

Ever since the strange mist took over their settlement and took his friends with it to god-knows-where, he didn’t once consider that another kid survived The Purge – especially, not this scrawny thing made of bones.

“What do you want?” Tom said.

“The shipwreck! Let’s go see it!”

“What? No! Didn’t you hear what the—”

“Oh, come on! You really believe in all that drivel? Gospels? Hah! More like a made-up fairytale!”

Tom, acutely aware of how close they were to the communion members, hushed him before blurting out the following through gritted teeth.

“Are you out of your mind! What if they hear you!”

“Are coming with me or not?”

Tom sighed. “Do you even know my name, Edmund Keyes?”

Edmund’s eyes grew wide and sparkled.

“Wow! You knew my name all along and still ignored me during the sermon?”

“I wasn’t trying to avoid you…”

“Then what were you doing, then?” Edmund pointed at Tom so suddenly that the poor thing flinched. “You! You were clearly trying to avoid me back there!”

“It’s just… I’m not used to… talking to people, that’s all! Besides, when the other kids were around, you never paid me any attention – not that the others did, either…”

“Really?” Edmund paused for a second to jog his memory. “Now that you say that, I don’t remember ever talking to you…”

“That’s because all you ever did was play with Jordan and- and—”

“But why didn’t you join us then? It’s not like we’d tell you off or something…”

Tom’s mouth gaped wide. “Seriously? I tried, remember!?”

“Oh, you did?”

“You don’t remember, do you?”

Edmund cracked a smile. “I must’ve been harsh on you I guess?”

“Harsh? Harsh! You said I was a loser and told me to scram it!”

Edmund scratched the back of his head. “Hey, I’m sorry, all right? Let’s forget about the past and focus on the present, yeah?”

“After spilling spoilt milk on me, telling me to, quote, ‘go and die’, and then pushing me into the mud in front of your stupid friends?”

Edmund opened his mouth to defend himself, but when Tom continued, he realised that there was no point in defending the things he had done. Since when had he been such a jerk?

“Well, can we at least be acquaintances and explore whatever’s going on at the shore?”

“Only if you promise not to call me a faggot again—wait a sec! You don’t remember calling me that either, do you?”

Edmund, smiling wide, ran for the hills as his new friend ran after him to give him a beating. It wasn’t that he feared getting hurt, for Tom’s hands were literally made of sticks, but because he hadn’t had this much fun teasing someone ever since the fog rolled in.  

When they finally slowed down in front of the forest trail that led to the shore, Edmund glanced at the darkening sky full of twinkling stars. How long had it been since he last saw the stars and the moon?

“Hey, Edmund…”

“Hmm?” he said without looking at the boy.

“Maybe this isn’t such a great idea after all.”

He faced Tom this time. “Don’t tell me you really believe in the Gospels?”

“There’s no reason for me not to.”

“It’s just a fairytale, you know? To scare people.”

“How do you know?”

“My dad told me. He’s an atheist.”

“Ath—what’s that?”

“Someone who doesn’t believe in fairytales,” he said, adding. “Dad said my mum helped him open his eyes and see the truth for what it is when they first met.”

“Ah, I see. But where’s your mum? I don’t remember ever seeing her…”

Edmund hesitated. “It’s a long story.” He then took the lead through the thick woods and picked up the pace. “Hurry now! We shouldn’t be late!”

“Late?” repeated Tom as he tried to catch up to Edmund. “Late for what? Edmund! Hey! What do you mean?”

But Edmund didn’t reply.

His darting eyes focused on the narrowing path ahead swallowed by the depths of the dense woods. In the shadows, he could almost hear their soundless breathing and feel their icy touch on his bare skin.

The Gate of Hell finally unlocked.

Gate of Hell – Part I

Photo by Brad Switzer on Unsplash

It was the 21st of November 1829.

The storm raged on for over two weeks without respite and blocked off all roads to Gaddon Township. No one understood why or how something like this could happen in their serene settlement, where nothing out of the ordinary ever happened.

When the mist rolled in a fortnight ago and blanketed everything in patches of fog, the last thing the townspeople expected was to be trapped in profound darkness and not see the light of day for two weeks.

The crops wilted, the flowers stopped blooming, and the clear air grew thick with nauseating fumes. Children suffocated to death in their sleep, as did the livestock, the pregnant miscarried and those who tried to conceive were left infertile.

On the seventeenth night, however, the deluge finally retreated and the air cleared up. On the surface, everything went back to normal. It didn’t.

The stroke of ill fortune carried on, and before the townspeople knew, only a handful of them pulled through.

From the twenty-tree children who once resided in Gaddon Township, only two survived what the remaining townspeople now dubbed ‘The Purge’.

One of these two fortunate kids was Edmund Keyes and the other was Tom Baker.

Edmund was a year older than Tom and was the only son of broke homme d'affaires, who relocated to Gaddon Township to take flight from his debtors. The Keyes earned their living working their fingers to the bone as husbandry workers for good ol’ Nanny Ruth.

The elderly woman had never wed and was born and raised in Gaddon Township. She inherited a lot of riches from her parents when they passed away two decades ago. She was now the most well-off person in the entire settlement.

Tom, on the other hand, was the youngest of eight children, with seven of them being girls. The Bakers worked the corn fields for the other townspeople and earned a shilling or two slaving through the day.

Those two, Edmund and Tom, however, had never crossed paths before.

When the parish priest, Mr Gilbert, told everyone to meet at the churchyard the day after the storm faded, that was the first time they saw each other.

“This is a bad omen,” preached Mr Gilbert, taking a short pause to make sure he had everyone’s attention. “Goody Jon, can you please tell these good folks what you’ve told me.”

Goody Jon, an elderly man with a hunchback who miraculously survived what those in the height of their youth could not, stepped forwards.

“Aye, indeed, it is a bad omen, good folks!”

Everyone held their breaths.

“As you are aware, ever since my lovely Rae passed away, I’ve taken a walk on the shore to reminisce our dying memories. Yesterday, when the mist cleared, I found something washed ashore, good people! A shipwreck a hundred years or more old!”

“Why’s it a bad omen, then, Goody Jon? Something so harmless, at that!” someone asked.

“Fool! Don’t you know the Gospels!”

Mr Gilbert, “Please, take a seat, Goody Jon. I’ll take over from here.”

Albeit reluctant, Goody Jon returned to his seat.

“Dear friends, it seems the Judgement Day is upon us all. No, calm down good folks! There you go! Let me finish, ye?”

The commotion died as soon as it happened. The townspeople had a lot of trust in the priest and heeded his every word like they were from the Lord Himself.

“It is of utmost importance none of you goes near the shipwreck. I know it’s harder than what it sounds like. But you must stay away at all times. Is that clear? Goody Jon?”

The elderly man muttered something that sounded like something between a sneer and a swear.

“As soon as the hills of snow melt, I’ll send a word to Bishop Tomas and we’ll figure something out. Until then, no one is permitted to—”

“Aye, we get it! How many times will ya repeat?” someone interrupted. The others agreed, and yet another commotion broke out. This time, however, it took more than a few minutes for Mr Gilbert to calm down the communion and get his voice heard.

“All right, then! Good folks, listen up! Let’s conclude with a sermon and a prayer.”